Miller, Ed. Smallll Stakes No-Limit Holdem

86 SMALL STAKES NO-LIMIT HOLD’EM

Say stacks are $200. The player under the gun limps, the button limps, and everyone else folds. You look down at 9♥8♥ in the big blind. You just sat down and don’t have stats on anyone yet. But it occurs to you that limping is fairly rare at these stakes. Therefore, your opponents are probably both passive and holding weak hands, unless the player under the gun is planning a limp-reraise.

While you’d normally check in this spot, this time you decide to raise. You have a fair shot of winning the pot outright. And if called, you expect to have good control of your passive opponents, and you’ll often steal the pot postflop. Plus, your raise balances your range so that you don’t always have a big pair when you raise out of the blinds.

You raise to $12 and both opponents call. Their ranges are weighted toward medium and small pairs, but could also include suited connectors, suited aces, and some big card hands.

The flop comes K♥7♦2♦. You have nine-high but decide that this is a good flop to c-bet on because your opponents will fold often. You bet $28 into the $37 pot. The player under the gun folds, and the button calls. The turn is the 6♥. What should you do?

On just about any other turn card, you would check and give up your bluff. However, the 6♥ was the best possible card for you. You now have an open-ended straight draw and a flush draw. Your weak hand on the flop has turned into a strong draw on the turn. Still, with only one card to come, you are likely at best a 2–to–1 underdog against a made hand.

If you check and your opponent bets, you may not have sufficient implied odds to call. He could overbet the pot. Or even if he bets a reasonable amount, you may find yourself in a sticky spot on the river. You’ll have to act first, and if you miss your draw, a bluff might be hopeless. If you hit your draw, you might not get paid, or you might discover that your opponent made a better hand such as a bigger flush.

Betting is the right play here. Your opponent’s range rates to be weak. He limped on the button and flat-called on a flush-draw flop. He may occasionally be trapping with two-pair or a set, but more likely he has a king with a weak kicker, a middle pocket pair, or a flush draw. He won’t often be able to call a big bet.

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The pot is $93, and you have $160 left. An all-in is an overbet of about two times the pot, but it maximizes fold equity against your opponent’s weak hands, and it also leaves you with no decision on the river. If you bet less and he has a strong hand, he will raise all-in and you’ll have to call. If he has a weaker hand, the oversized bet will ensure that he folds hands like K♠8♠ or J♦T♦. You should bet it all unless you think an all-in will look weak, in which case you might bet smaller.

Delayed Bluff

The first two players fold, and you make it $7 in the cutoff with Q♠9♠. The button and both blinds are weak-tight. If instead the button were a tough player or the blinds were aggressive, folding might be a better play.

The button folds and both blinds call. The 16/11 small blind has $194 behind, and the 13/9 big blind has $128. You cover both with $945. (It’s been a good day.)

The flop comes 8♥4♦2♠. Both players check. Low dry flops like this are good to bet in $1–$2, because they are unlikely to hit your opponents, and weaker opponents are relatively unlikely to try a resteal. Plus, here you have some pot equity with your overcards and backdoor flush draw.

You bet $13 into the $21 pot. The small blind folds. The big blind thinks for a few seconds and calls. His range is weighted toward onepair hands, including pocket pairs. He would probably have reraised preflop with a premium pair, and he would typically fold overcards to your bet. His checkcall suggests a set, a small pair, or gutshot.

The turn is the A♣. He checks again. This is usually an excellent spot for a second barrel. The ace is a scare card, and a bet will often chase out his middling one-pair hands.

However, you have another option. You can delay your bluff until the river. The advantage is that you mix up your play and gain one more street’s worth of information. If he happens to have a set or be suspicious of your turn bet, you take advantage of the fact that he has to act first on the river.

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You check behind on the turn. The river is the 4♥, and your opponent checks one more time. The river card and check are good for you because they make a set less likely for him. The third check in particular makes this a good spot to bluff.

Your opponent most likely has one small pair. The pot is $47, and he has $108 left. Bet it all. He’s not the type of player to make a hero call, so put the maximum pressure on him.*

If you think he’ll fold nearly the same range of hands to a pot-sized bet that he will to an all-in, you can consider betting $40 or $50. That way you save some money in case he has a monster. But on the other hand, if he’s not likely to try a sophisticated river trap, you might as well push. Sometimes players will fold to an all-in but talk themselves into a call for less, even if they’re putting in three-quarters of their stack.†

A Three Barrel Bluff

The 31/13 opponent in this hand has the short stack at $140 and plays straightforwardly after the flop. He limps, and you raise to $8 on the button with 4♦4♥. Only the limper calls. The pot is $19.

The flop comes 9♥8♥3♥, giving you a small pair and a very weak one-card flush draw. The limper checks. You bet $12, just under twothirds the pot. The limper calls.

The turn is the J♣. The limper checks, and you fire a $32 second barrel, about two-thirds of the $43 pot. The limper calls. After the call, the pot is $107 and the limper has $88 remaining.

* A hero call is a call of a large bet with a relatively weak hand in hopes of snapping off a bluff.

† The math here is counterintuitive. Say your opponent folds 60 percent of the time to a pot-sized bet of $47. So how can betting $108 be better if you can’t win twice as often? The answer is you don’t have to win twice as often. The pot-sized bet that wins 60 percent of the time shows a $9.40 profit. To show a $9.40 profit, the $108 bet has to win only 75.7 percent of the time. If it instead wins 78 percent of the time, the $108 all-in bet is superior to the $47 pot-sized bet.

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The river is the Q♦. The limper checks, and you move all-in for $88. The limper folds.

Preflop, the choice to make an isolation raise with position and a small pocket pair was standard. You will likely have all the advantages in the hand: a stronger hand, position, and more postflop skill.

This flop is a decent one for a continuation bet. If the limper lacks a heart, it will be difficult for him to continue far in the hand. Also, since this player is straightforward after the flop, he isn’t likely to try a rebluff checkraise.

The call could represent wide range of hands. It could be anything from a made flush, a set, or two pair to just a single pair, a straight draw, or a large heart like the naked A♥, K♥, or Q♥.

The turn J♣ is a good card to fire a second barrel on. Since it’s an offsuit overcard, it could scare off a flopped nine, eight, or three as long as he doesn’t have a ten or big heart to go with it. The $32 turn bet is large enough perhaps to get the limper to fold the naked K♥ or

Q♥.

The river is another great bluffing card. It puts an overcard and a four-straight on board. If the limper was calling with a single pair, he’ll likely fold to an all-in push. Notice also that the stack sizes are perfect for a bluff, as an all-in bet is just a bit less than the size of the pot. That makes the bluff profitable if it will elicit a fold from a better hand about half the time.

In reality, the player will likely fold more often than that. After the turn call, the most likely hands are two pair, one pair, or a draw of some sort. If the limper held a stronger hand like a made flush or a set, he might well have checkraised by now, or might at least have bet the river, particularly with a made flush.

Most of the time when you get called, the limper will have made a straight with a ten such as JT, T9, T8, or perhaps AT with the ace of hearts. These straight hands were relatively unlikely in the ranges we put the limper on for the flop and turn.

Sometimes the limper will call with two pair, and sometimes he’ll fold two pair. If he has weaker hands than that, you can generally

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expect a fold. The turn and river cards are both good ones for bluffing, which is what makes this three barrel bluff worth trying.

Don’t get too bent out of shape when a three-barrel bluff like this one fails. While it’s tough to lose your stack bluffing, each bluff makes sense, and the overall line is profitable and helps you to get paid off when you flop a big hand and fire all the way.

Lessons for this hand:

Non-ace overcards are often good cards to continue bluffs on the turn and river.

River bluffs are often smart when the hands that can call the river are, generally speaking, not the same hands that called on the flop.

River bluffs tend to be more effective when they are all-in, so you’re in a prime bluffing situation when the remaining stacks are roughly pot-sized.

Three Barrel Bluff Against An Ace

Effective stacks are $200. The 16/13 under the gun player opens for $7 with K♦Q♥, and only the TAG big blind calls. The big blind plays a 21/17 game preflop and hasn’t yet seen a showdown at the table.

The flop comes A♠8♠4♣. The big blind checks, the under the gun player bets $11, and the big blind calls.

The turn is the 9♦. The big blind checks, and the under the gun player fires a second barrel of $28. The big blind calls.

The river is the 7♣. The big blind checks, and the under the gun player bets $92. The big blind calls for time and folds after about 30 seconds.

Opening from under the gun with king-queen in a 6-max game is a fairly standard play. The big blind is tight, so his calling range won’t be too wide given that he’ll have to play the hand out of position against a raise from up front.

The ace-high flop is a good target for a continuation bet, so the under the gun player bets about three-quarters of the pot. The big blind calls. He could be calling with an ace, a flush draw, a pocket

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pair, or even a gutshot. He could also have a set or aces-up. Hands like 98s or 87s are possible as well.

The turn is an offsuit nine, which is a roughly neutral card for the player with king-queen. If the big blind has a flush draw or a pocket pair other than nines, the nine didn’t improve him, but it makes two pair for ace-nine and nine-eight, both hands in the big blind’s range. Given that the big blind is tight and unlikely to have improved on the turn, under the gun decides to fire a second barrel—$28 into the $37 pot.

After the big blind calls this bigger bet, we can put him on a stronger hand. Most likely he has an ace, probably with a weaker kicker than a queen since he’s been 3-betting frequently preflop and probably would have done so with ace-king or ace-queen. He could also have a flush draw or possibly a stronger hand such as aces up or a set.

The river is the 7♣. This card is good for under the gun because it doesn’t complete the big blind’s possible flush draw. Also, it puts a possible straight on board which might spook the big blind a bit.

When the big blind checks again, we can discount sets and two pair from his range. With strong hands like that, most players would have bet or raised at some point by now. They aren’t impossible, but at this point they’re unlikely. So the most likely hands for the big blind are an ace with a non-premium kicker and a missed flush draw. Since the big blind is tight and doesn’t get to showdown often, the under the gun player tries to push his opponent off a weak ace with a pot-sized third barrel. Since the big blind called for time before folding, a non-premium ace is likely exactly what he had.

Trying to push someone off top pair with a big river bet isn’t wise against all opponents. Some opponents are simply too loose. When you make the bet, they may think to themselves, “I must be beat again,” but eventually they’ll call because they “have to see it.” Against these players, consider making a small-sized river bluff like $20 or $30 into the $93 pot. It may be enough to push your opponent off a hand such as a small pair plus a flush draw that didn’t improve. Bluffing is not a binary “to bluff or not to bluff” decision. You can make big bluffs, medium bluffs, and small bluffs, and they will fold

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out different ranges of hands. One bluff size can be unprofitable while another is profitable. Consider all possibilities before acting.

A full-bore 3-barrel bluff like the one executed in this hand can work well to push tight players off of top pair. If you put your opponent on a likely top pair due to the action, and you think your opponent really won’t stack off with just top pair, consider launching a big river bluff.

We have given many examples of firing multiple barrels in this section. Before we move on, it’s time to ground these plays in reality. We do not recommend firing two or three barrels at every “good” barreling opportunity. If you bluff too much, it becomes obvious, and opponents will start checking big hands to you and calling down with weak hands. But if you rarely fire a second or third barrel, your game has a serious flaw. Multiple barrel bluffs are mandatory in modern online 6-max $1–$2. Use them wisely, but don’t be afraid to fire away when the situation is right for it. Also, be prepared to lose a few extra big pots. That is just part of the game.

Going For Value With Good

Hands

Until now we’ve focused mainly on using position and an aggressive barreling strategy to steal pots. But going for value is just as important to no-limit success, and most people do it quite poorly. Learning to value bet correctly will help you in two major ways. First, you will extract value from hands you might have checked down before. Second, it will make you harder to read, and therefore your opponents will be more prone to making mistakes against you on all hands.

The classic value betting error most players make comes on the river. They check down far too many decent hands. For instance, a typical player will flop top pair with a strong kicker, bet it on the flop, bet it on the turn, and then check it down on the river. One major problem with systematically playing your decent hands this way is that it severely polarizes your river betting range. We’re not saying you should avoid the bet-bet-check line entirely. It’s often a solid line. But you lose value when you overuse it.

A polarized range is one that includes mainly very strong hands and very weak hands, but relatively few middle-strength hands. If a typical player shoves all-in for a pot-sized bet on the river on a K♦9♠8♦5♣3♦ board, for example, you can usually assume that the player holds either a flush or a bluff. Very few players would shove this river with a hand like KQ or 98, and many players would check down even KK or 76.

To some extent, everyone bets the river with a polarized range. It would not often make sense to bet a hand such as A9 on the above board unless you were trying to force out a better pair, as better hands will tend to call while worse hands will tend to fold. But the trick to betting with a polarized range is to keep your frequency of betting good hands roughly balanced with your bluffing frequency. If these two frequencies get out of whack, you become exploitable.

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Balancing your value betting and bluffing frequencies doesn’t mean you split them 50–50. According to game theory, if you play against a near-perfect opponent, the best balance is one such that your opponent is damned if he calls and damned if he doesn’t. If he calls, he pays off your good hands, and if he folds, you win your bluffs. Game theoretically speaking, the optimally balanced frequencies against such an awesome opponent would depend on the pot odds your opponent is getting to call. If you make a pot-sized bet, for instance, your opponent is getting 2–to–1 on a call. (Betting $100 into a $100 pot offers your opponent a chance to win $200 at a risk of $100.) The optimal frequency (for game theorists) with this bet size when holding the nuts or nothing is therefore 2 value bets for every 1 bluff, or 67 percent value bets and 33 percent bluffs.

If you bet half-pot, you offer your opponent 3–to–1, and your optimal balance would be close to 3 value bets for every bluff.

In practice, you can’t possibly hone your strategy to hit these frequencies every time. Nor do you want to! Your opponents aren’t near-perfect. They are flawed, and you should exploit their flaws. For example, they will in general overestimate your bluffing frequencies, so you don’t have to bluff as often. Just make sure that your river betting ranges include significantly more value bets than bluffs. Likewise, ensure that you do indeed make enough river bluffs.

For instance, say you bet only the nuts for good hands, but you bet all of your busted draws for bluffs. You would be making a lot of big river bets. Any opponent who watched you play for a while would realize that when you bet the river, you’re almost always bluffing, since catching the nuts is uncommon. Rarely bluffing is similarly bad since an opponent can safely assume you have a huge hand when you bet.

Because you should keep your polarized range balanced, the fewer hands you value bet, the fewer bluffs you get to make. If you don’t value bet aggressively enough, not only will you miss bets that you could have won from weaker hands, but you’ll also have to skip profitable bluffs down the road to avoid unbalancing your range. Compulsively checking down rivers is a bankroll-killing double whammy.

The reason most players check so many rivers is that they fear a raise or checkraise. For the most part, that fear is unwarranted. Yes, if you start betting more rivers, you will get bluff-raised off your hand somewhat more often. But it won’t be a frequent occurrence. Meanwhile, you’ll be extracting more value from good hands and winning more pots by launching successful bluffs. The extra money your aggressive river strategy makes you will, over the long haul, dwarf the amount you lose to the occasional well-timed bluff-raise.

Bet the river. This may be the single most important thing you will do better than your $1–$2 opponents after reading this book. River bets are large and lucrative. Don’t be shy. Bet your hand. Your opponents will call you with weaker hands. When you bet top pair on the river, you’ll find yourself getting called by second pair, third pair, unimproved pocket pairs, even ace-high. Why are they calling? Because you could be bluffing.

Now you might say, “I’m not about to start betting top pair on all three streets every time. That’s a recipe to get myself stacked every time someone makes two pair or better!” You definitely don’t want to shovel money into the pot blindly every time you flop a pair. Going for value is more complex than betting like a robot. Nevertheless, betting the river with medium-strength hands has an undeniably positive effect on your strategy. What’s the solution to the problem?

Plan your betting from the start. Think about your total hand range, not just the hand you happen to have. In this case, you have top pair, but from your opponent’s perspective you could also have a flush draw or a straight draw or overcards. Plan your betting on all three streets so your top pair will, given favorable turn and river cards, look like a busted flush draw by the river. That could mean checking the flop or turn. Or it could mean making a small, weak-looking bet at some point. Then bet the river with gusto and watch your opponent call to snap off your “bluff.” If you play this way, you’ll extract value more consistently from weaker hands, and you’ll offset your occasional losses when your opponent happens to hold a monster.

Also, don’t worry too much about the hands your opponent could have. Consider mainly the hands he’s likely to have. For instance, if you have KQ on a K8467 board, and you bet the K84 flop and your